The Northern Advocate Daily “NORTHLAND FIRST” WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 31, 1938. The Soft Pedal Of Socialism

Northern Advocate, 31 August 1938, Page 4

The Northern Advocate Daily “NORTHLAND FIRST”

WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 31, 1938. The Soft Pedal Of Socialism

Registered for transmission through the post as a Newspaper

AN interesting feature of the political campaign as it reaches keener intensity with the approach of the elections is the attempt of the Labour Party to divert attention from the fundamental issue of Socialism on which the election must be fought if it is to represent an honest and informed judgment on the two opposing schools of political thought which are struggling for mastery in New Zealand today.

At one time the Labour Party took unanimous pride in that basic principle of its political theories expressed in the objective, “the socialisation of the means of production, distribution and exchange.” In the past two years, however, those who guide Its destinies in Parliament seem to have noted the alarm induced among responsible sections of the community by the practical operation .of a socialistic policy. . They realise that this, alliance might spread so ’widely among many who voted Labour in 1935 without a full realisation of the implications of its policy as to imperil the existence of the Government, and they have taken steps -toiallay it by-a process which is aptly known as, “applying the soft pedal.”

Among those practising this gentle art is the Hon. P. Webb, Minister of Mines. Speaking in Auckland last Friday at a luncheon arranged by the Institute of Business Executives, and again in Parliament yesterday, Mr Webb reiterated the contention, worn pretty threadbare by Labour spokesmen recently, that the Socialism issue is a bogey created to discredit the Government. Business, according to Mr Webb, has no reason for apprehension about any measures enacted or contemplated by the Government, which does not want to take business away from private enterprise, but to co-operate with it. ,

Apparently it is just “ co-operation” when the Government steps in to take the dairy farmers’ produce, arbitrarily and with no right of appeal. It is “co-operation” when it puts old-estab-lished firms which had dealt in butter and cheese for years clean out of business. But the proprietors of those firms, and the employees who lost their jobs when they shut their doors, probably take a different view. Nor is it likely that the proprietors of the many transport firms which have been taken over on a wholesale scale by the Government, see eye to eye with Mr Webb as to the benefits of this sort of co-operation. Many such services are not being taken over and closed down, but are being taken over and run by the Government. The socialisation of the means of distribution is in progress. /

Actually it is futile for Mr Webb to deny that Socialism, complete and absolute, is the ultimate objective of the Government, for even if the Govrnment had really jettisoned the ideal on which the party is founded, the final determination of policy lies in other hands. Even if Mr Nash, Mr Savage, Mr Semple and all the others were not Socialists at heart, as they have proclaimed themselves so often in pas.t years, they may not depart fropi the instructions laid down for their guidance by the Easter conference, the “Parliament of the Labour Party,” to which every Labour M.P. is answerable. In the final analysis, it is the Easter Conference which at present rules the New Zealand political scene. Until the Easter Conference repudiates Labour’s gospel of Socialism, no tactical disclaimers can carry conviction, whether they emanate from Mr Webb or anyone else.